American Cartoons Brought To You By--North Korean Slave Labor?

Here's a weird report from the Asia Times: The thriving Korean animation industry--and specifically the studio that animates The Simpsons (although they deny that that program was ever outsourced)--appears to be quietly subcontracting its work out to DPRK drones.

Korean-American Nelson Shin, who runs a company that does the Simpsons, wasn't very forthcoming about the business relationships between his company and chained-to-their-desks Nork animators:

"As far as I know, there were some Italian and French movies made in North Korea. But I am not aware of any American cartoons made in North Korea."

Shin also noted the technical difference of production origination between "made in" and "made by". He took the example of The Lion King. "It's a Disney film. However, if Disney Europe, not the Disney company in the US, gave North Korea the production order, then it is not a deal placed by an 'American' company." ...

Meanwhile, when asked about the similarity of cartoon characters between Empress Chung and the ones seen in recent US animation movies, Shin said, "It's inconvenient to talk about it on the phone."

But Beijing-based Jing Kim, who claims to be Shin's subcontractor for North Korean labor, says otherwise:

Apparently, however, according to Kim, Empress Chung was not the only film made by North Korean cartoonists. Shin, who heads Seoul-based AKOM Production, a unit of KOAA Film in Los Angeles, allegedly outsourced to North Korea part of the animation contracts that his firm had originally received from the United States.

On one occasion, for example, North Korean animators employed by Shin came to Beijing from Pyongyang to work exclusively on several US animation movies, staying there for months, according to Kim.

When asked whether any of the movies were actually broadcast in the US, Kim said, "Oh, a lot, a lot. The ones that I participated in were as many as seven."

But Kim declined to name the US films, citing the sanctions imposed on North Korea. "If the names of the US companies are known, they will be screwed," said Kim.

If there is currently a U.S. Attorney working in LA, he or she might be interested in talking with this Mr. Kim about the possibility of a Hollywood end-run around U.S. sanctions. Kim says that rather than paying the North Korean animators directly, he just wired $170,000 directly to "North Korea". Where, one assumes, it was converted into plutonium.

P.S. The article implies that The Lion King was outsourced as well, but I don't see how it happened through this arrangement--Kim and Shin met in 1999, but the Lion King came out in 1994. Shin's company was in business then, but whether they had a North Korean connection then isn't clear.